Free

I cannot get this word out of my head. Free. It's like the word God has given me for this year. Which seems strange, because it is probably one of the most challenging and "boxed-in" years of my life. Not all bad. Just a lot of sitting, waiting, enduring. You might possibly have guessed it by now, but sitting is not my strong point...

Being a parent to 3 littles is a lot. If you want to do it right (whatever "right" is). I'm pretty sure even the best of parents will be begging forgiveness all throughout their children's lives. So by "right" I mean involved. Not farming out the majority of our parenting responsibilities and privileges to everyone but us. Not being constantly engrossed in my world, my to-do list, my priorities... but delving into them. I'm a firm believer in kids respecting and having other teachers and authority figures in their lives,as well as good times of separation and independence. But let's face it - kids don't raise themselves. Or they shouldn't. It takes so much active thought, preparation, and intentionality. It's wonderful. It's nearly all-consuming. It's exhausting. It's the best thing ever. I once heard someone say, "Life without kids is easier. Life with kids is better." Ditto that.

Growing a baby is a lot. For me, it's not an easy journey. I know many women have it harder than I do, so I will not even pretend to have the corner of the market on pregnancy challenges. I am young, I am healthy, and my body makes babies like a champ. However it is grueling for me - 3-4 months of intense nausea, the hormonal insanity (yes, I mean every bit of that word, ask my husband) and a whole host of physical changes and ailments of which I will spare you. Some women glow and adore being pregnant. I lock down and zone in and gut through it like a spartan. Don't be shocked at my lack of sentimentality... it's just not my thing. Yes, feeling the baby move, knowing it is being knit inside my womb is an incredible thing. But the 9 months of wanting to crawl out of my skin!? It is par for the course. And when that little face arrives, I glory. Because at last, there is the precious bundle! And there is the end of the journey up the mountainous region of rocks and serpents and forest fires and werewolves and... well, you get the picture.

Homeschooling is a lot. Now we are not the people that view it as our religion or our children's salvation. We take it one year at a time, one child at a time. I am not a natural-born teacher. Nor do I love it. But as we sit down and write out our family priorities and our goals and consider our children's needs and gifts, thus far it has been the best choice. We do not judge those who do nor do we eliminate the future possibility of our children being in school. Yet for now, it's where we are. It's got glorious perks, and yet, it has some real intense challenges. Trying to help one child figure out how to carry the 1 to the 10's place and another how to sequence correctly and another climbing all over the table and me and the school papers and the supplies like a monkey, with cars and trucks flying every which a way is a recipe for pure insanity. And some days it has baked up quite nicely.

Owning our own business is tough. House hunting in the Franklin market is tough. Not having family nearby is tough. Living in 1100sq feet is tough. Life is just plain tough.

And yet we breathe a sigh of relief because grace is there. For the weary, the overwhelmed, and the tough situations and callings of life. I am not here to complain, but to highlight why the word free is so shocking and so timely for me.

This is the year of the Lord just really undoing me. It's like He's preforming open heart surgery to reveal what is truly inside. What is clogging the flow of the precious freedom of His blood. I'm shocked at what is inside. And yet that just reveals more of my yucky pride.... to think that I was better than this in the first place.

It all began earlier in the year with reading "Grace for the Good Girl." Having grown up in such an amazing christian home and social environment, and coming to know Jesus at an early age, I honestly lived a "clean" and "good" life. Yet throughout the years I began to depend more and more on my goodness and obedience and less on Jesus. My undoing began when I realized how hard I tried and how little I tapped into the power and freedom of Jesus Christ.

It wrecked me. Wonderfully!

Since then that journey has just continued on. The Lord digging deeper, purging further, and revealing Himself more. It's hard and gruesome yet so kind and merciful. I have found myself crying my eyes out in agony yet rejoicing that He isn't leaving me to myself. He is in the business of changing. And He's changing me!

Lately I've realized the lie I'm believing: the lie that somehow, I'm overlooked. And as I dig deeper I see it stems from a false belief system of entitlement and pride. That God owes me something for my obedience and faithfulness to Him. That I am in reality comparing my life to what I think I deserve, and He calls that foolish.

While it is so hard to watch my stability, strength, and endurance crumble, it is so freeing to see Jesus stand in it's place and fight for me.

"The Lord will fight for you, you need only to be still." Ex. 14:14

"Your God has commanded your strength; Show Yourself strong, O God, who have acted on our behalf." Ps 68:28

It's all about Him being strong, Him fighting for me, Him acting on my behalf. Not me. Not my endurance or persistence or undying commitment. Makes me think of the promise in Phil 1:6 that "He who began a good work in you will perfect it..." He will perfect it. Not my acts of righteousness.

Therefore the Lord has told me to sit. To let go. To relinquish control. To be weak. To hold my hands out, open and willing.

The hardest.thing.in.the.world.for.me. If He told me to go fight a battle, I would be on the front lines. If he told me to take charge, I would have a plan of action and a chart to go with it. But when He tells me to sit, I'm like a 2 year old ADD kid in the time-out chair, bouncing up and down and biting my nails and flailing my arms wildly while singing the alphabet backwards in Spanish. It makes me go bazurk!!! It's like somebody is stepping on my dang air hose! To put it mildly. And yet.... He has made it so clear. Sit. Wait. Trust. Rest.

So....... freedom. How do you come into play?

"Where the spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom." 2 Cor 3:17

"Where you are, is where I'm free
Holiness is Christ in Me". - Matt Maher, "Lord I need you"

As Brandon Heath sings,

"you know the effort I have given
you know exactly what it cost..."

It's so crazy to think of all our "effort" as being part of the cost of Calvary. That our sin of commission, even in seemingly good things, stealing God's glory. That my attempt to be Rosie the Riveter is really just my attempt to play God.

I know that He makes us all different. Some of us are easy going, day-to-day living, simple, happy people. That's great. Some of us are type-A, energetic, high strung planner people. That's great too. I'm not mad at how God designed me and the gifts and strengths He's given me. But I just truly want it to be all about Jesus. Not all about Suzanne. And He is seeing to that ;)

So my word freedom comes into play when I realize that sitting in that "time-out chair" is really God's way of setting me free from my own bondage of doing. Of taking on more than He has equipped me to when I try to play God. Freedom in letting Him lead, letting Him be in charge, letting Him care for me. Freedom to rest, to take on a yoke that is easy and a burden that is light. Freedom to return to "faith as a child" and play, dance, laugh and sing in His glorious sunshine. Freedom from care and worry knowing He cares for me far more than the daintily dressed lilies of the field. Freedom from concern about provision, for after all we can trust Him for our daily bread. Freedom from exhausted effort and an invitation to growth and pruning and more growth as I abide in the vine I am eternally grafted into.

I never thought freedom was what I needed most. I've never been in prison or had a drug addiction  But I have been in bondage and am returning to the joy of my salvation.... just Jesus. Circumstances are not changing right now. Neither is Jesus. I live caught in between those to paradoxes and find I am cast upon the Rock of His security.

I am free to run
I am free to dance
I am free to live for you
Yes I am free
-Newsboys